Labels: Alina the Wanderer, Tourism, Tourist Attractions, Travel Destinations

• flight to Bucharest to Dortmund/Dortmund to Bucharest - WizzAir - 270 EUR for 2 persons. No serious incidents. A 30 minutes delay because the stupid personnel of the Baneasa Airport had sent a refueling truck that had no fuel left...
• Baneasa Airport generally sucks. First they announce boarding for our flight at gates 3 and 4. One slight problem: gate 7 does not exist. Then they announce boarding at gates 1 and 2. Gate 2 is of course closed...Really poor organization! And to think that they've been closed for renovation for so long! I still prefer Otopeni.
• Meal during the flight - you can have a sandwich, drink and something sweet for 6 EUR. But their selection of sandwiches is really limited and you end up having nothing to choose from, only one type was left by the time they got to the middle of the plane.
  
• Train ride - round trip - Dortmund to Alkmaar - 195 EUR for 2 persons. At first I though I should have chosen a direct flight, but this turned out to be a pretty adventurous experience and I've enjoyed every minute of it.
• Dortumund airport-Dortmund Central Station: bus 440 till stop Alplerback (2.10 EUR per person) and metro U47 util the station (another 2.10 EUR per person). The ticket buying machine is quite complicated, especially when language selection is not working. Pray for people who speak English.
• Bus fare in Alkmaar - 1 EUR per person/per trip. Really great Aloe and Apple juice in the Turkish market. Really good cappuccinos. Interesting hot dogs. Yesterday I knew how to ask for a hot dog in Dutch...

Labels: Alina the Wanderer, Travel Destinations

Labels: Hotel Reservations, Tourist Attractions, Travel Destinations

Labels: Alina the Wonderer, Personal

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Labels: Alina the Wonderer, Mind-troubling Questions

That’s why having an extensive database of all available charities might turn extremely useful and also convincing. That’s why I like Charity Navigator so much. What do they understand by Intelligent Giving? Well you start by searching their site and locating a charity you really believe in. You can search by category, alphabetically or by number of stars a charity has been awarded (stars range from 1 to 4).

The charity I have selected is Action Against Hunger. Charity Navigator has detailed information on each charity, including their usage of available funds, total revenues and comparisons with other similar charities. It gives you a feeling of transparency and helps build trust.

Foto from the AAH site.

Established in 1985, AAH is the US branch of Action Contre le Faim, an international, non-governmental, non-religious organization. Founded in Paris in 1979, ACF focuses on fighting hunger, malnutrition, physical suffering and the associated distress threatening the lives of children, women, and men in extreme situations such as wars, conflicts or natural disasters taking place around the globe. ACF has over 400 experts in fields such as nutrition, agriculture, water and sanitation and public health working in 40 countries from 5 continents. The local teams ACF employs amount to 6,000 people.

Who is behind Charity Navigator? His name is a Navtej Kohli, a business owner doing a great job as a philanthropist. Mr. Kohli’s charity, the Tej Kohli Foundation has an experience of 5 years in philanthropic activities. As he explains, the personal experience one has when meeting those in need directly renders charity works efficient:

Take a tour of both Charity Navigator and the AAH presentation page and then decide for yourself how you’d rather help.

Brought by Mr. Navtej Kohli

Labels: Charity, People in Need

If you are looking for a blog featuring accommodation news, travel tips, featured destination and pretty much every piece of information useful while traveling, I recommend the Accomline blog. If you want luxury to surround you on your trip, read about the most expensive cities in the world. As most of us know, London is one of them. Moscow, however, was a big surprise for me.

Although a little different from the Accomline website, the blog inherits the same color range and has a pretty clear, easy to read template. One of the articles I enjoyed a lot was the one on transforming trains and trams into hotels. One of the train hotels is actually located in the Netherlands, maybe I’ll get to see it during my vacation there.

Accomline’s Blogline also features articles published on the AsiaHotels blog. Structered as tops (three cheapest cities for shopaholics, 5 weirdest things Chinese people it in Guanghhou) or as guides, they can turn out to be quite a useful resource for people traveling to that part of the globe.

The blog was only started last month. Thus, it is pretty new and lacks relevant reader feedback. I’ll keep an eye on it to see how well they do at replying comments and keeping the conversation going.

Labels: Alina's Reviews, Hotel Reservations, Travel Blogs, Travel Destinations

Car donations can turn out to be a very good way of helping others. How would a Donate my car action actually help? Well, single mothers would have an easier life taking their children to and from school, extracurricular activities and so on, you would be helping others distribute promotional materials, you’d also be helping homeless people, teenagers and adults with addiction problems, you’d also be facilitating food distribution and making life better for orphans.

A simple old car donation can help achieve all that and more. Such a gesture should not be seen as charity only, as one willing to donate an old car, a boat or a trailer can benefit from certain advantages, such as tax deductions, avoiding all the fuss involved in getting smog certificate and other papers from the Department of Motor Vehicles, having the car picked up for free when it’s no longer running and canceling your insurance while still keeping the plates.

The CarAngel Ministries are a non profit auto donation charity specialized in facilitating give away of old cars, boats, trailers etc, thus saving you the time of selling your old automobile. While you help them help others, you also help yourself as CarAngel handles all the hassle.

Labels: Alina's Reviews

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